The Guardian Shuts Down Reader Comments as the Left’s War on Dissent Continues
by Allum Bokhari
1 Feb 2016

The Guardian has announced it will close comments underneath articles on race, immigration, and Islam. The reason, according to the ultra-progressive newspaper, is that such topics attract an “unacceptable level of toxic commentary.”

Vox Wrote:The overwhelming majority" of people's comments at Guardian are ones the editors don't like, that they characterize as "racist." "Racist" means nothing these days in typical discourse. For ex., I love how people talk about "racist" attitudes toward Muslims, as if "Islam" is genetic, a matter of biological race. And, of course, it's "racist" if European and European-derived (EED) people want to protect their cultures, pay attention to little things like borders (you know, those things without which you can't have a country), to not want to play host to a financially parasitical underclass who suck up in benefits more than they produce, to not want to have to "imprima el numero dos" in order to pay a bill by phone, to not want their wages driven down by cheap labor -- and to not have to compete for jobs against a larger pool of competitors in the first place. And so forth. (of course, if Jewish people in Israel want all the above sort of thing, it's OK. Because Hitler.)

The Guardian’s new policy stipulates that comments will only be opened under articles covering those topics if moderators “have the capacity to support the conversation” and “believe a positive debate [is] possible.” They did not explain what a “positive debate” on immigration would look like. Readers are welcome to take guesses in our comments section, which will of course be open as usual.

Vox Wrote:A "positive debate" to these progs could only involve things like trying to figure out which cities should serve as "sanctuary cities," or how to best go about allowing Muslim men to retain their precious and beautiful culture while not being quite so "rough" with women, and how the media should deal with stories about Muslim raping and blowing things up without making Muslims feel unwelcome or inciting violence from the Idiot Bible and Gun People.

Anyway, it's hilarious that these Leftists apparently really, truly thought that normal people think the way they do, that the see Leftist solutions as just "common sense," isn't it? They are so incredibly out of touch with -- well, reality, that it's almost sad.

The Guardian, too, was part of this left-wing adulation of open commentary on the internet. They continue to call their commentary pages “comment is free,” after the late C.P Scott’s dictum, “Comment is free, but facts are sacred.” It’s become a point of mockery for the paper’s critics in recent years, as the removal of readers’ comments (no matter how many facts they contain) grows ever more severe.

Vox Wrote:

The left’s embrace of comments sections lasted only as long as commenters agreed with them. Once the masses started challenging the elites above the comment line, it was only a matter of time before the innate authoritarianism of the regressive left showed itself.

The “fourth wave” of feminism, as it was then called, has suffered a rapid change of fortunes. The Rolling Stone UVA rape scandal marked a turning point in the panic over campus sexual assault. GamerGate, meanwhile, took away the dominance of progressive feminists on social media. It’s now common to see high-profile columnists and commentators challenging modern feminism, where once only the anonymous dared stand up to their online mobs.

Yet for a great deal of time, one of the only places to safely challenge the myths of modern feminism was in the relative safety of the anonymous comments box. Between 2010 and 2014, articles about gender and feminism at The Guardian and other left-wing publications often resembled a war between authors and commenters.

With the online battles over feminism drawing to a close, the front lines of free speech on the internet have now shifted to the topic of immigration. There, once again, progressive elites are at odds with the masses. The former want open borders, with as little discussion of the disastrous problems caused by immigration as possible.

The latter, astonished at the perceived blindness of their governments, fear that the truth is being covered up. They want to know about the migrant-driven crime wave that is sweeping the European continent. They want to know about the rise of Islamic extremism in ghettoised immigrant communities. They want to know the truth, and discuss it in the comments section.

That’s not what the regressive left wants. The same Guardian editors who wrung their hands when their readers challenged feminists on the non-existent campus rape culture are now horrified by discussion of the very real rape culture that has suddenly appeared on the streets of European cities.

It’s not just editors that are clamping down on online discussion of the refugee crisis, though. As Breitbart recently covered, police in the Netherlands are reportedly visiting the homes of people who are too critical of Europe’s migration policies. The German government, meanwhile, is working with Facebook to censor discussion of the refugee crisis on the world’s biggest social network. Unlike the feminist war on comments sections, this new one has the cooperation of powerful European elites.

Never before have so many ordinary people been able to express themselves to such a large audience, with so few filters. It terrifies authoritarians, which is why they’re so obsessed with controlling discussion online. Old elites in the establishment media are no longer the masters of information, so regressives are scrambling to build new systems of control on the web. The war on comments sections is just one part of that. With elites determined to intimidate and censor the online critics of immigration, free speech on the web is about to face its toughest challenge yet.

Things are only going to get Worse. Censoring is going to pick up. Especially with all this stuff going on with the dissident right who troll the Internet to trigger SJWs. It'll be interesting to see what happens. Facebook and Twitter are already shutting people down.

Iv read that in some parts of Europe making negative statements on social media about the refugees can get you in trouble with the authorities.

This is all true. I have noticed when I try to have conversations with my more liberal leaning friends they have a real shutout philosophy: it's not enough to try to control the conversation they have to win it and you have to like it! As I am sure anyone on this forum knows and can appreciate.

As far as Facebook shuttering accounts because of what THEY term hate speech; it seems to me that as long as they own the mechanism they will be able to dictate the terms.

(02-02-2016, 03:03 PM)AugustineNYC Wrote: This is all true. I have noticed when I try to have conversations with my more liberal leaning friends they have a real shutout philosophy: it's not enough to try to control the conversation they have to win it and you have to like it! As I am sure anyone on this forum knows and can appreciate.

As far as Facebook shuttering accounts because of what THEY term hate speech; it seems to me that as long as they own the mechanism they will be able to dictate the terms.

Absolutely true. That is until competition comes along and codes an anti-Facebook that garners more influence.

I can always count on The Guardian for anti-American remarks, especially in the comment box. You got Brits who missed their tea time so they're grumpy and American expats who are bitter. for whatever reason.

Regarding the absence of discussion on certain topics, it's been my observation that the British bans (The Right) if they're too "extremist" e.g. Michael Savage to their liking. I also notice they pretty much ignore GOP politicians visiting as compared to DNC politicians.